Miss-Match
by K Hanna Korossy
Summary: What's Up, Tiger Mommy? tag: Out of sync, out of practice, out of sorts, but still in each other's thoughts.


**Miss-Match**  
K Hanna Korossy

Sam hefted Mjolnir—Thor's freaking hammer—while he thoughtfully gazed into the Impala's trunk. It would take up a lot of space but, man, what an addition to their armory...

Dean's step behind him had him dropping the hammer in without a second thought and turning to his brother. The expression on Dean's face told him all he needed to know.

"No sign of Kevin?" he ventured.

"Or his mom, or Crowley." Dean's voice seethed with frustration. "Even that wiener angel's gone."

"Huh." All that was left was a warehouse full of corpses of old gods. Just another day in the life.

"I know, right?" Dean raised and dropped his hands. "I mean, Mrs. Tran wasn't even firing on all cylinders—how'd they move so fast?"

He paused, and the same thought seemed to strike him as it did Sam. They eyed each other. "You don't think...?" Sam started.

Dean considered it a moment, then shook his head. "Naw, if Crowley or someone had grabbed them again, they wouldn't've left a note. In blood."

Sam winced, recalling all too clearly Crowley's parting words: _The Winchesters...well, they have a habit of using people up and watching them die bloody._ And Dean's sober assessment of Kevin, _He thinks people I don't need anymore, they end up dead._ He cleared his throat. "Hey...what Crowley said...you know it's not true, right?"

Dean shrugged. "He's a demon, Sam—I wasn't exactly expecting a thumbs-up." He circled around Sam to the trunk and started disarming himself, pulling weapons from his jacket, pants, and God knows where else, to drop them into the car.

"Yeah, but..." Sam chewed his lip. "It's not your fault. Kevin—"

"I was gonna kill his mom—I know I'm not his favorite person right now." A small automatic—not the Colt that was always on Dean now—was followed by two blades.

Sam made a face, a knot tangling in the pit of his stomach. "You were really going to—?"

A small throwing knife pinged on the growing pile of weapons, and Dean shrugged again. "Hey, it was better than whatever Crowley was gonna do to her." A gris-gris bag of some kind. "My job was to protect Kevin; anything else was collateral damage." The holy water flask.

Collateral damage. Sam blinked. A year ago, Mrs. Tran would've been someone's mom. Now she was just expendable.

Sam swallowed and turned toward the passenger door. Dean really had come back different from Purgatory. The brother he knew would've been scraped raw from being reminded of how many loved ones they'd lost bloody. But while Sam had been trying to make him feel better, this Dean didn't need it.

Sometimes he didn't know if it was really Amelia he missed, or just simpler times.

00000

He saw Sam turn away out of the corner of his eye, but something about his posture made Dean take a second look. The rounded shoulders, the hanging head: this wasn't the guy who'd defiantly looked Dean in the eye and told him he'd moved on instead of looking for his brother. What was twisting up his panties _now_?

Dean replayed their conversation in his head as he patted himself down to look for any stray weapons he'd missed: talking about what happened to the Trans, what Crowley had yammered about, what Dean answered...

His hands slowed. Yeah, okay, maybe that hadn't been the most... _sensitive_ thing to say. Yes, he was ready to sacrifice Mrs. Tran to kill Crowley, but it wasn't like he was looking forward to it or anything. Sometimes you just had to break a few eggs to fry the King of Hell.

" _It's not your fault."_

...But maybe that hadn't been what Sam had really been saying.

"Sam."

His brother paused, turning back with what even Dean recognized was weariness. A year of Purgatory's rules left him out of practice with everything normal, from picking out clothes to dealing with people. There'd been no place for diplomacy in the monster afterlife. But he still could read his brother, if he made the effort. Maybe he needed to make more of an effort. When it was easier to defend his car than his kin, something needed to change.

Dean cleared his throat. "It's not your fault, either. You know?" He'd forgotten that while he might not need reassurance, Sam did. "The, uh...well, any of it."

He winced, knowing how lame that sounded, especially when they both knew the rat bastard hadn't looked for him while he was in Purgatory. Dean took a breath, rubbed the back of his neck: _Empathy._ He was trying to empathize.

"We'll find them, okay?" he said, meeting Sam's eyes. "Before Crowley. They'll be okay."

Sam's face, hard and obstinate practically since Dean got back, softened like a snowball in the sun. "Yeah. All right." Little brothers grew up, but they never stopped being little brothers.

And even Purgatory hadn't purged the big brother out of Dean. He nodded, looking away from Sam to the empty parking lot, the bushes nearby, the trunk. He paused just as he was about to close the lid, and frowned. "What's—?"

Sam took a step closer and barely looked in before he said, "Oh, that's Mjolnir."

Dean screwed up his face. "Mole-what?"

"Mjolnir. Thor's hammer. Remember from the auction?"

Dean gaped at him. "Thor's... Like, Hemsworth-Thor, that Thor's hammer?"

Sam was almost smiling. "Yup."

Dean stared at it. It was smaller than he'd have thought. And...wouldn't hurt anything to...right?

He reached out and grabbed it, paused, then lifted. It was heavy, but only gravity weighed it down.

"Weren't sure you'd be worthy?" Sam's voice came wryly behind him.

Yeah, still a little brother. "Shut up, Sam," he said without heat. Thor's hammer—that was way cool. He set it down. They were definitely keeping that puppy. He closed the trunk with care, then stepped around to the driver's side, raising an eyebrow at Sam over the hood. "You're the one who's got the hair for it."

Still, despite everything, the big brother.

 **The End**


End file.
